Disclaimer: Merlin's not mine.
The Afterfall
"Gaius," one of the knight's voices called out.
The old man's ears were not what they used to be. He turned around, expecting to see Leon, begging for advice about Gwen or ready to accuse him of hiding Merlin, or Gwaine, asking where Merlin was taking Gwen and why on earth he wasn't allowed to go with them (although why such worries should be any of Gaius's concern right now was entirely beyond him). But the knight who called to him was neither—it was Percival.
"I—was hoping I might speak with you," he stuttered out. For a moment, Gaius felt a surge of protective compassion that used to be saved for Merlin. Or Gwen, or Arthur, or, a long time ago, for Morgana.
"Of course," Gaius responded shortly and gestured to the stool by his table, "Sit down. It will be easier on my neck if I don't have to look up at you." The young, giant man blushed and obediently took a seat. "Care for anything to eat? There's some leftover from the dinner I had with Merlin earlier."
"Oh, um, yes. Thank you."
Gaius raised an eyebrow—he hadn't expected the knight to accept it, but he suppose such a large person would never refuse an offer of food. And perhaps Percival was hoping to bide time to work up the courage to speak.
"You've—" he managed after a particularly long swallow, "…known about Merlin the whole time, haven't you?"
The question was more for confirmation than anything else. "I have," Gaius nodded and watched Percival return it, looking troubled but not surprised.
"And he's always protected Arthur, through and through?"
More than all of your swords put together was what Gaius almost said. "He has."
"But it hasn't been simple as that, has it?"
Something about that phrasing took Gaius aback for a split moment. No was the immediate answer that sprung to his lips, but the sad, confused acceptance on Percival's face made it an unnecessary response—the overgrown boy of a knight already knew that.
"Gaius, I don't know much about magic," he breathed in slowly, then everything streamed from him in one breath, "—and everything I do know is horrible and from the hands of horrible people like Morgana. Leon said she wasn't always like that, and I know he blames magic for everything she did. I also know that it doesn't take magic for someone to be horrible…it was Cenred's still-living army that killed my family, not her. I've seen Merlin save us and I've seen what he did to Leon…and I—"
"You want to know…" Gaius interrupted him, staring at the table, "—if he can be trusted."
"I don't know if I want to know," Percival's head was down, too, "…but you know I need to."
It took Gaius a long time to answer. In all that time, all he did was lose focus on the supper that Merlin left halfway finished. Halfway.
He supposed Merlin could have eaten nothing at all.
"Three days ago I would have said yes," his throat finally managed. "Yes, you can absolutely trust him. Now, I…" he shook his old head and felt his old hands trembling. Old. Never felt so old and the thought made him inhale deeply until he could straighten his back and meet Percival's eyes again. "What I know for certain is this: alienating Merlin will help none of you. It will only make things worse."
Percival's mouth twisted uncertainly. "Gaius, I—I'm not someone who can easily stand by people who…people whose hands I can't leave my life in."
Something like a huff of laughter filled Gaius's chest. "The bloody round table—hah! It's spoiled you lot rotten…oh, heavens, Arthur spoiled you lot rotten."
Percival (unlike Leon or Gwaine, Gaius realized after he reflected on the words he just said and wondered how careless he had gotten as to speak so offensively of the recently dead) just sat there, steady with a stern, heartbroken gaze. "And now that he's gone?" his voice was so quiet. "What do we do, sir?"
Gaius blinked. "I'm no one's 'sir,' Percival, you are," he coughed, shook his head, and grabbed the table to support himself as he finally sat down, "—and it's amusing that you think I know what you should do."
"You know Merlin better than all of us," was the unflinching reply.
"Not so well anymore," Gaius responded, staring off far away. "He's lost." A pause. "Perhaps the best advice I can give to you is to be lost with him."
Percival's frown deepened. "You think the people of this kingdom deserve to be ruled by people like that?"
"No, but that's all that royal subjects ever get regardless," Gaius stood and took Percival's clear dish to the sink. "As for Merlin, you are all going to need him. He's the one person Arthur never deluded with all this talk of golden-age heroism, which makes him the best wartime leader you'll be able to find."
The squeak of scrub on plate was loud enough for a moment to almost drown out Percival's next shocked question from Gaius's losing ears. "Who said anything about wartime?"
Gaius shrugged. "Who needed to?"
In retrospect, Guinevere realized she should have been expecting this. The image in her head was oddly certain it would be some aged druid leader, possibly battle-scarred and hardened, or a witch of either stunning beauty or wrinkled wisdom, or just someone old before their time, someone young, born running from Uther and the whole of Camelot in general. Of course, it was none of those. It was the dragon. Growing larger and nearer.
Of course it had to be the bloody dragon.
"What do I do?" she frantically screamed over the sound. What she meant by this question, and how Merlin was supposed to respond to it, she had no idea. He kept looking straight ahead at the giant monster, his jaw fixed with something like anger. He stepped forward and the dragon swooped down with a final gust so powerful Gwen swallowed it and felt paralyzed. She strained her neck back to stare up at the thing, panic racing through her every nerve as she realized the size of the thing—tall and old as the mountains it looked, with nothing but a pair of bright yellow eyes to focus on as the moon illuminated every crevice and color in its skin as it opened its jaw—
"I did not expect you to summon me so soon, Emrys," a grand, quaking voice, unlike any voice Guinevere had ever heard in her life, "And why is it you have chosen now to bring her here?"
"You know exactly why, Kilgarrah," Merlin shouted up at the beast and Guinevere realized he was speaking English. The dragon spoke it, too. She had assumed it was the ancient tongue she'd recently acquired, but no. The thing with wings and a name could talk as if it had been schooled in a bloody library. "Something's been happening since he died you didn't warn me about, but you already know!"
"Lower your voice, Emrys," the dragon's voice soothed and slid as it lowered its long neck. Gwen could see its ancient face even more clearly now, "…I understand you're still hurt, but we have a guest you have yet to introduce me to," and those round golden eyes that Gwen realized were now very clearly fixed on her.
Not all the propriety of all the queens in the world could keep her from stepping back away from that gaze, but Hunith's shoes managed to keep her from total collapse.
"You know who she is," Merlin said scathingly. Gwen's brief glance at him revealed his cheeks were wet and eyes were red, but with nothing other than anger. Almost rage.
The huge eyes blinked at Merlin before the dragon paused. It then turned to her and—no, Gwen was sure she hadn't mistaken that gesture—genuinely bowing its enormous head. "Queen Guinevere," the voice trembled with power, "It is, indeed, an honor."
Gwen stared dumbly at the head with a flitting urge to reach out her hand and pet it, or shake the dragon's hand in introduction, or something saved for circumstances far more normal than she would likely ever experience again. "Actually, we've," she—to her horror—squeaked, "…hem, ah, we've met before, as a matter of fact." And the word fact was so incredulous in the current context she almost snorted aloud.
Kilgarrah the dragon seemed almost to frown. "My memory is failing me, your majesty, I have seen and met a great many things. Tell me, when was it we met?"
"Well, not met, per say," she hadn't sounded this young in ages, "—you tried to set me on fire."
"My sincerest apologies. I'm afraid we all do things we later regret when suddenly set free."
Gwen nodded because she couldn't think of anything else to say.
The man standing next to her was living proof.
"She can speak in the dragon tongue," Merlin's mouth lashed out in that heavy, thick language.
The protruding shelf above the dragon's eyes that Gwen supposed passed as a forehead lifted slightly. "Can she now?" he leaned even closer to her and she had the unmistakable feeling she was being studied.
"Yes, she can," Merlin said through a grinding jaw. "How is that possible?"
Kilgarrah paused a long time before answering, watching Gwen the entire time. It took every muscle in her frame to keep herself from squirming. "The rules seem to be changing, Emrys," he finally said slowly.
"It started when Arthur died." Even in this new tongue, Guinevere didn't miss the way Merlin's voice broke at that name and the way her own body suddenly stilled without effort.
"Yes, it would have," Kilgarrah responded.
"Can't you just answer me?" Merlin was crying now, Gwen didn't need to look at him to hear it. "For once in your life can't you just tell me what's happening without any riddles?"
Kilgarrah raised his head and finally turned his stony gaze to Merlin. "This is unfamiliar territory to me as well, Emrys. Never before have we lost the Once and Future king so near to the fall of the dragon race."
Since Merlin seemed momentarily rendered unable to speak, Gwen stepped forward, inhaled deeply, and began in English, "What exactly do you mean sir, er, Kilgarrah?"
The dragon's eyes crinkled at her. "Are you afraid I will criticize your grammar in my own tongue, young queen?"
"No, I am not," came her automatic response, "—nor am I afraid to ask for help in whatever language necessary."
Kilgarrah seemed to bow his head again. "It truly is an honor, Guinevere," hearing her own name in that unearthly voice sent another shiver through her. "I shall do my best to explain what I believe is happening, but I warn you, this may not be pleasant to hear."
Gwen felt her hands ball into fists at her sides. "If you have been watching us for as long as I think you have," she began, still shocked at the ease with which the language left her throat, "…you already know how much we can stand."
The enormous yellow eyes closed for a moment. "Emrys," his voice suddenly shifted. "What else has inspired you to seek me out?"
Gwen frowned and didn't expect to hear Merlin's faded voice answering, "Freya can speak to me anywhere now, no matter how far from the lake I am."
"Then it is as I suspected," Kilgarrah said. "Young warlock, the fabric is breaking."
"I'm sorry," Gwen hesitated, feeling herself slip language again. "I do not understand."
"Magic, your majesty," the stare the dragon leveled at her was so powerful she couldn't escape it, "—regardless of what you have previously been told, is patterned like a tapestry. Arthur's birth led Uther to try and remove magic's cover from this world. He slaughtered sorcerers and the dragonlords and finally the dragons themselves. Because of this, it was Uther's children, the witch and the prince, who needed to repair the damage he'd done, but they could not do it alone." Those eyes moved to Merlin, who seemed unable to meet them. Gwen watched as her old friend stared shaking at the ground, at his feet, while the dragon loomed overhead.
"Morgana too?" Gwen managed, still gazing at Merlin.
"The witch," and she did not miss the disdain with which the dragon spat out the word, "—and the warlock born of Uther's same treachery, were destined to battle on either side of the Once and Future king." That, apparently, was enough to snap Merlin back to attention.
"I was not born of Uther's treachery," he growled. Gwen felt the same fear, so unfamiliarly associated with Merlin, shoot through her as it did when she caught glimpse of his attack on Leon. Without thinking to she latched her hand around his wrist.
"You were born of your mother, Merlin. Your mother who took in the last dragonlord when Uther forced him to flee," the dragon responded almost softly, as if with patience and love. "You have known all of these pieces for years but have never considered it as a puzzle whole."
"You're telling me I was born with a miserable destiny to fix Uther's mistake?" Merlin roared. "You're telling me Arthur and Morgana were two of those mistakes?" His pulse Gwen held in her hand raced with something unnatural—
"No, Emrys," Kilgarrah swelled horrifyingly to his full height "—all of you were born to prolong everything that has always kept this world together!"
Gwen yanked Merlin's ready arm down as she stepped forward. "And what is that?" she yelled, wanting both of them to stop, stop, and realizing there was no way for them to, no more than there was for her.
"Magic, your grace," Kilgarrah smoothed. "You are seeing it appear in strange places and people because it is the the fabric of this world and that fabric is coming loose—two of its most central threads have been pulled through."
"What do you mean?" Gwen asked, feeling a slow desperation start to cling at her chest.
"I mean you have been dropped into Albion and no prophecies exist to map the patterns of such a place and age. The witch who wished to extend magic past its natural reach is dead. Her brother, the prince who defended his people by stopping that dangerous spread, was killed at her hands. The warlock, destined to oversee that great battle, chose his side—he defended the Once and Future king and killed the witch. Now Merlin is the last remnant of the Old Religion's foretelling except for myself, and I…"
"You're dying," the low words came from Merlin and Gwen turned to him, so shocked she almost released her hold on him. She moved her eyes frantically back to Kilgarrah and, for the first time, noticed the wing at his side.
"I am, Emrys. And soon."
A frantic halting pace started making its way through Merlin's words, "Freya said—Aithusa's in danger…" The image of the white, crippled child dragon flashed before Gwen's mind.
Kilgarrah nodded once more, looking almost menacing for the first time, "Yes, yes she is."
"Who from?" Gwen asked hesitantly.
"That remains to be seen, although there will be no shortage of enemies seeking to destroy her once the significance of Arthur's death has been made clear across the five kingdoms."
"But why?"
Kilgarrah bent his neck back. "Because Uther's pride was what allowed magic to survive in the end—he could never bring himself to kill me."
Merlin started again and Gwen could see the spasms shooting through his face and frame. "And you're saying that—that would have ended—"
When he appeared no longer capable of phrasing it aloud, Gwen began again for him, "If you had been killed from the start," she said carefully, working through the deductions as quickly as she could, "…magic wouldn't have survived?"
Kilgarrah said nothing for a moment and the silence was filled with all the gravity of yes. "I was the last dragon then, young Guinevere. I am still one of the final anchors tangible magic has to this earth. It will never disappear completely, but had I died at Uther's hand all those years ago? Then yes—magic would have become much more difficult for any human being to harness alone."
The sheer numbers of magical attacks she'd endured growing up in Camelot hit Gwen with full force as she cycled through the images in her mind—goblins, griffins, unkillable soldiers, and finally Morgana in her unbelievable, grand beauty, sitting on a spiked throne. To think they could all have been impossible nearly made her stumble back.
But…
"But Merlin," she blurted to Kilgarrah, ignoring the boy turning blankly to face her out the corner of her eye. "You just said he's been foretold to be this great savior warlock of all time, or something of the sort, isn't that right? Regardless of what happened to you, he still would have been born."
Kilgarrah only seemed wryly amused by her objection. "He would have lived past a certain age, yes. But Emrys, you remember the first year you spent in Camelot?" Merlin's eyes grew cold like flint, as though he already knew what the dragon was about to say. "Tell me—how long into that year do you think you could have survived without my help?"
From the way Merlin's jaw hardened, Guinevere gathered this was a rhetorical question. "You're telling me that Aithusa will be the next chance for anyone who wishes to douse out magic forever once you die?" he responded harshly instead.
Kilgarrah tilted his great head. "I am."
"But you're wrong. Aithusa isn't the last remnant of the Old Religion at all. The Diamair's still alive, there's the Druid leaders, a couple score monsters of every kind and hundreds more sorcerers born and practicing in secret all over the world—"
"Merlin," the dragon interrupted, sounding almost kind, "…none of them have stepped into this story, the story of Camelot, for long enough to hold magic down."
Gwen stared at her friend and realized that Merlin no longer looked angry. He looked broken. He looked as if there was no hope left.
"Camelot was built on such power, Emrys," Kilgarrah continued, "—and this kingdom's strength should never have been tampered with. When it was, the whole world shook. It has been happening for decades. Uther only happened to be the final straw."
Merlin nodded vaguely. "And Gwen?" he asked, as if an afterthought. Gwen couldn't have explained it if she tried, but the sudden mention gripped her with a warmth that only came to her right before she felt the need to cry.
Kilgarrah did not need elaboration. "I believe our young queen," here he acknowledged her and she felt unbalanced again, "…was able to tap into the power of such speech so she could help the young warlock protect the last dragon," he paused. "Perhaps the ability of dragontongue was also made as a gift."
Gwen felt her whole being tense. "Why?"
The dragon's eyes narrowed. "Your presence was foretold too, Queen Guinevere. Someone who could be trusted with a throne after a war and loss as heavy as the witch and the king? Such a person could only be found once in an age."
It seemed to be a compliment, but it did not make Gwen feel any lighter. She rather felt like lead, hot out of the hearth and waiting to be cooled into a motionless, horrible weight. Next to her, Merlin stood still, and his wrist had grown cold as ice in her hand.
Kilgarrah's gaze moved between the pair of them on the ground and bowed once more. "It truly has been a pleasure, your majesty. I am only sorry we could not be introduced sooner. I have wanted to meet you for a very long time." He lifted his head, "I am sorry too, Emrys, that you should have to hear this news so shortly after your battle. Please do not hesitate to summon me and never forget you are not alone."
"You say that," Merlin almost whispered—Gwen was shocked to hear him capable of any speech at all, "…as if you think I'll ever fight in wars like these again."
"Oh, but you will, Emrys," Kilgarrah responded, "—and you should."
"I never asked for this," Merlin growled in that other tongue, sounding more like a dragon than the dragon itself. "None of us did."
Kilgarrah shook his head. "That is true—you did not. You have centuries' worth of prophecies stacked up against you, all of you. That is not fair, but it cannot be helped. Believe me when I say you would want to fight if you could see the outcome as those seers did. This world…it will be a very different place after all magic you know is gone."
So this one's extra long. Sorry about all the exposition guys, I hope it wasn't too boring or dense to read. Review and tell me if it was, I guess! And hope summer's off to a decent start for all y'alls.